


Trying to be Better

by pknote



Category: DCU (Comics), Impulse (Comics), Young Justice (Comics)
Genre: Anxiety, Depression, Fluff, Gen, I'll add tags, Like all my others, Redemption, THAD IS A GOOD BOY DC, THADS BROKEN ALRIGHT, past emotional trauma, this is a slow update piece, yiiikes
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 06:38:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18005753
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pknote/pseuds/pknote
Summary: Thad finally has the chance to turn his life around. Be a normal kid, living in the 21st century and put his past (or more accurately future) behind him. He has the opportunity to have the family that  he's always wanted, but has never gotten to have.





	Trying to be Better

“You’ve changed, Thad… And I couldn’t be more proud of you. You’ve come so far already. It would be easy for you now to cast aside these plots and schemes… and be good! To have a happy life…!”

“Do- do you ready think I could…?”

“Of course! You’ve already taken the first steps! You’re already halfway there! You can do it… And we can help you…!”

“... Okay.” 

 

*****

Max Mercury hadn’t told the rest of the speedsters of his ‘new’ nephew. After Thad had tried to kill him, Bart, and probably Wally at some point, he found it best not to mention that the demented speedster was living under the same roof. Besides, Thad barely spoke to anyone. He disassembled Craydl, saving the pieces to be reassembled later on. And spent most his time laying on his bed, just waiting for Bart to return home so that they could play some more video games. 

He only spoke with Bart, and the majority of it was apologizing.

Maybe it wasn’t quite time to introduce Thad to the Allen and Wests but it was time to force him to make friends.

“Bart, Thad! Come downstairs” Max shouted, looking at his watch and before the second hand ticked, the twin speedsters were down in front of Max, surprisingly quiet. Bart already ready for school, a whole ten minutes before it started. 

“What is it Max?!” Bart asked, tilting his head as he punched Thad in the arm, in a way to tell his clone to pay attention. 

“We’re going to run to the store-” He stopped mid-sentence reaching out to grab Bart before he ran off “ _ -drive _ to the store. And get Thad things for school.”

“I don’t need school supplies.” Thad grumbled, looking up.

“You do, if you’re going to be attending school with your brother.” Max smiled, letting go of Bart as the speedster perked up. 

“Thad’s gonna be coming to school with me?!” 

“That’s the plan.”

Thad scoffed, letting out a small laugh as he turned to walk away, “No thanks. It’ll just be a waste of time.”

“AWWW Comeon, Thad!” Bart whined, causing his clone to glare at the boy. 

“I’ve already meet all your so-called friends. There’s no point in me attending school when i don’t even need to learn anything more.”

“You, Thad. Need to learn to make friends, We’re going to go get you supplies and everything you need, at normal speed, and then sign you in for your first day.” 

“You’re just trying to torture me, Mercury.”

“In a way. But this is for your benefit, get out and make friends, instead of sitting around the house all day plotting schemes.”

“Fine, but just so that you get off my back.” Thad spat, yelping when Bart grabbed his arm and began pulling him towards the car. 

It was quiet, around 8am when they got to the store, The more erratic speedster elated to have missed an hour of class already, while the calmer of the ‘twins’ walked quietly next to their guardian. Looking around at this 20th century store. ‘Target’ it was called, everything was displayed in ways that made it seem almost impossible to grab; a 4 foot pyramid of apples that were on sale, but if you grabbed one in reach it seemed like the rest would topple to the ground, burying whoever grabbed it. “They’re trying to kill us?”

Bart laughed at this, “No, Thad! They’re on a stand.” and to prove his point, when given a skeptical look, he ran up and grabbed one from the middle, the apple simply leaving a small hole which showed a cardboard holder on the other side. “See?”

“Confusing…”

“If you two would stop ogling over apples, the backpacks are over here.” Max shouted from a few aisles over.

“Let’s go, bro! They’ve got one that looks like Grandpa Barry’s suit!”

“Yeah, okay.” 

The three of them made their way over to the supplies section of Target, specifically the row of backpacks hanging on the walls. They browsed over them, Bart pulling pack after pack off the shelves and bringing them to Thad for approval, each one being denied again and again. Thad groaned and reached for a random bag off the shelf, a light blue hue to it. “I’ll go with this one.” He muttered, clearly not happy with his choice, as he walked back over to Max who had gone and got the rest of the supplies needed while the brothers were trying to find the perfect bag.

“Wait! Thad look!” Bart spoke, pointing to where Thad had just removed the bag he held in his hands. “I think you should get this one.”

The bag seemed to be the last one left, a shoulder bag that must have made its way over to the two straps once the previous kid had realized the colors were wrong for it to be their favorite speedster. It was an easy mistake to make, the only clear dictator was the backwards lightning bolt. One that brought a smile to Thad’s face, causing him to drop the blue bag and superspeed over to the bag, pulling it off the rack. “Thank you, Allen.” 

“Anytime, Bro!”

Max simply ended up chuckling, glad to see a smile on Thad’s face for once. “Are you two all ready?”

“Yep!” Bart smiled skipping around  happily until they paid and got in the car, heading to Manchester High School. Where Thad would have his first  _ real _ experience as a teenager. Not as a 31st century weapon to use against the Allen family.

From what it seemed, from the small smile on Thad’s face as he gripped tightly to his new bag, is he was ready too. Ready to fully redeem himself and join his family on the good side. The first step with this change, is to experience school with his ‘brother’.

Max Mercury had left the speedster boys at the principal's office, watching them go off, Bart Pulling Thad along down the halls to meet up with his friends, the latter very unamused by all the idle chatter that came from the 9th grade class upon seeing a new student. One who looked surprisingly like the one who pulled him along.

“Hey Bart!” A tall black haired girl shouted to get his attention. However she stopped in her tracks as Bart waved, his arm moving up just enough to show Thad behind her. “Bart… Why’s  _ He _ here? He tried to kill you!” 

“I’d like to inform you, Carol. That I’m trying to change!” Thad spat, Gesturing to himself, “No mask, no Craydl. Just good old Thad.” It was strange to him, having worn the Inertia costume for so long, and now being part of a school, that a couple months ago he was  loved in, but that’s because he was Bart, or was pretending to be him at least. 

“Yeah… Sure, the evil clone of Bart is trying to change.”

“He really is, Carol. Thad’s been living with Max and I for a couple months.” Bart smiled, adjusting the backpack strap on his shoulder. “Max thought it’d be a good Idea for him to come with me to school.”

Carol narrowed her eyes at Thad, as he stood up straighter to show that he wasn’t scared of some civilian. “I’ll be watching you, Thawne.” 

“You’re not the only one.”

*****

The first class that Bart and Thad attended together was Math. A standard freshmen algebra class. Bart took his spot in the back of the class, tapping the desk next to him for Thad to sit down. The two falling silent until the class started.

The problem with Bart’s algebra class wasn’t the skill required to compute the problems, or the few confused students walking in and seeing a ‘blond Bart’, it was the perkiness of the teacher. As soon as the bell rang she was calling Thad up to the front of the class to introduce himself. The teen refusing to move until Bart got up and pulled him up front. 

“I'm not going to introduce myself, Bart.”

“Bart Allen, will you please introduce your friend, so that the class can get to know him.” The teacher smiled gently, as Bart nodded.

“This is Thad Thawne, my brother.”

“Half-brother.” the mentioned pitched in, looking down at the ground.

“No…?”

“We have different last names, Allen. We’re half brothers.” his tone was almost threatening as he looked directly at Bart. “Remember?”

“No?”

“You’re an idiot.” Thad rolled his eyes, walking back to the desk in the back. Bart glancing down with a confused look. 

“Hey, Thawne! Isn't that the name of one of the Flash’s Nemesis?” One of the kids in the front mocked, sticking his leg out right as the blond walked past and tripped the speedster. “Oh look at that. Big bad, Zoom wasn't fast enough to catch his fall.” 

The rest of the class began to laugh, as Thad pulled himself up, grabbing the boy by his shirt and hoisting him up, his hand that was just out of the boys view vibrating so that he could push it through the boy's chest without leaving a mark. “So what, kid? I have the same name as the notorious reverse flash. Still puts me above someone who doesn't even. Have one  _ similar  _ to anyone important!”

“Break it up, boys! Now class, please calm down and open your books to chapter 15 we’ll be working on quadratic formula today.” That glared at the teacher before dropping the kid and walking the rest of the way back to his seat.

While the rest of the class took notes, except those who usually didn’t, Thad spun his pencils in the back of the room, writing a few notes on the subject, but others simply written in interlac and then thrown at Bart. 

“Mr. Thawne! Haven't we had enough  trouble from you for one day?” The teacher shouted, walking over and catching one of Thad’s notes mid throw. “If you have something to share with Mr. Allen then you can share it with the class.” before Bart or Thad could take notice she opened up the note, looking confused at the language that it was written in. “Thaddeus, would you please translate your code for the class.”

“No, ma’am I will not.” 

“Thad, part of being good is not causing excessive amounts of trouble” Bart hissed under his breath

“Hypocrite…” Thad took a deep breath, standing up and taking the note back from the teacher. “First off, it’s not some code, it’s Allen and I’s first language. And second It says that this math is pointless.” He smirked, “With a few other vulgar words that don't translate well.”

“If you believe that math is so pointless why don't you go up and do number 5 for us.”

“Gladly.” Thad got up, considering running and putting a pin on the teachers seat, something quite harmless that she could never prove was him, but decided against it when Mercury's words of him being halfway there rang in his ears. Sighing he walked to the front, snatching the textbook from Bart as he passed. When he got to the front he wrote down the problem. A surprisingly hard one for students who were just learning it, gave a smile towards the teacher and began solving it. Writing excruciatingly slow just to prove his point. When he was done. Thad dropped the chalk and walked back to his seat, going back to paying little to no attention to the teacher as she chuckled a little at Thad's answer. 

“Incorrect, Thad.” she stated as she wrote the correct answer on the board. Next to Thad's combination of circles, triangles and lines. 

“Incorrect?! That's the exact same thing! You're just too dumb to realize!” He snapped before standing up and racing out of the room. 

Bart reached after him, but Thad was already gone before he could counter. Sighing he stood up, glancing at the board, the answer was right, just written entirely in Interlac so that it looked like gibberish to everyone else. Taking his eyes away from the board, Bart ran after Thad, not caring if he asked to be excused. He didn't usually anyway.

“Thad! Wait!” Bart shouted after his clone. Breaking into a full on superspeed Sprint to catch up with the boy that was halfway home before he slowed down to a walk. 

“What do you want, Allen?” Thad spoke.

“I wanted to see if you're okay?” Bart replied, grabbing onto Thads arm to keep him from running off. 

“Why in Hell, would I be okay?!” The blond shouted. “We weren't there for even five minutes and a kid already tried to tease me! The teacher laughed at me because of writing in Interlac! And you Bartholomew! You didn't do anything to stop it!” Thad started to shake gently, yanking his arm away. 

“I…”

“Don't even try it, Bart. You're trying to reform me, which I agreed too. But if I'm going to be called evil by your classmates due to being a Thawne. They didn't even try to get to know me before making accusations!” Tears began to fill his eyes, “I'm trying so hard! To be good, to be like you and the rest of the speedsters. But, Bart I need your help in order to do that.”

“Of course, bro! I'll help you as much as I can; after all we're both Thawnes right?” Bart smiled and held out his hand. “How about we go for a run? Get suited up and just run, try school again tomorrow?”

“That sounds great.” Thad smiled, taking Bart's hand, “Then could you teach me how to write in English?”

Bart gave a small laugh, “Yeah, now let's go!”  

The brothers looked at each other before a smirk grew on Thad's face, both of their rings opened, spitting out the contrasting suits. Less than a second later, Impulse and Inertia were running off side by side, and for the first time. Not fighting.


End file.
